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Takeover of Postwood Park beach this summer cost Town of Potsdam nearly $58,000

Posted 9/20/21

BY ADAM ATKINSON North Country This Week POTSDAM — The town’s takeover of the management of Postwood Park and beach this summer has cost them $57,973.03. The total cost includes $45,791 in …

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Takeover of Postwood Park beach this summer cost Town of Potsdam nearly $58,000

Posted

BY ADAM ATKINSON
North Country This Week

POTSDAM — The town’s takeover of the management of Postwood Park and beach this summer has cost them $57,973.03.

The total cost includes $45,791 in personnel expenses for salaries for the new recreation director and lifeguards, and $8,865.03 in contractual expenses, Town Supervisor Ann Carvill told North Country This Week. Carvill said the contractual expenses include the $5,576 the town spent on a new lawn mower for the park. The personnel and contractual expenses were covered by the town’s newly formed $80,000 recreation budget, she said.

The remaining $3,317 in the total amount paid for labor costs for town highway workers who did maintenance at the park this season.

Town Highway Superintendent John Keleher, during the town board meeting Tuesday, Sept. 14, gave a brief rundown of the numbers for maintenance at the park.

Keleher said following the park reopening on June 22, the highway department worked on landscaping, tree trimming, garbage cleanup and grill maintenance. Water service was turned on and the water tested as well. Then from June 25-Sept. 7, two of the town highway department’s summer helpers took care of morning garbage cleanup and grass cutting and tree trimming.

“They did an amazing job,” Keleher said.

On a two-week rotation a town highway worker would clean and sanitize all of the facilities at Postwood throughout the season as well.

After closure on Sept. 6, the highway department stored the boat rentals, disassembled the water pump and cleaned the facilities.

Keleher told the board that the summer helpers worked 119 hours, which cost the town $1,666 in labor costs for the season.

The town board is mulling moving cash from its recreation budget into the town highway budget to cover the expense of upkeep by town highway workers for the park. Such transfers are common in other municipalities to reimburse the budget of departments who provide services outside of their normal purview to other municipal departments.

The town took over management of Postwood this summer after the village of Potsdam’s recreation director declined to reopen the park this past spring citing ongoing vandalism, garbage and high costs of running the program there. The director estimated that it cost about $40,000 per season to field lifeguards at Postwood beach and about $8,000 per season to transport youngsters from the village out to the beach. Morning cleanup usually fell to village recreation staff.

The village had traditionally managed the program and received money from the town for running the park and beach during the summer. This year, the town had budgeted $160,000 to give to the village for their recreation program. Half was to be allocated to Postwood and half to the winter recreation program.

After the village’s decline to open Postwood, the town broke the contract with the village to run the program and formed its own recreation program. It opted to keep the second half of its budgeted recreation money for the village and use the $80,000 to run its own program.

August revenues

During the various discussions about the park that took place at the Sept. 14 meeting, Town Clerk Cindy Goliber said Postwood generated $2214.77 in revenues in August.

Those dollars included $1,160 in donations, $715 kayak and paddle board rentals, and about $340 from snack bar revenues.

Some of those revenues will pay for an adaptive swing for next season, Goliber said.

Infrastructure

Later at the Sept. 14 meeting, Town Councilwoman Sarah Lister said SUNY Potsdam professor Adam Wheeler’s wilderness education students will be working on the trails at Postwood in the off season, and one of the students will be working on development of a GIS map of the trails.

In addition, Town Councilman Marty Miller said he had recently met with local architect Rebecca Weld at the park to review the space and come up with some concepts for future projects there.

Retroactive hires

Finally at the meeting, the board approved the retroactive hiring of additional lifeguard staff. Alexandria Quinn was hired as a lifeguard at $14 per hour retroactive to July 8. Jasmine Nezezon-Sanders was hired as a substitute lifeguard at $13 per hour retroactive to July 12.